Sacrifices
by Bagelwoman
Summary: Mal is caught in battle with himself and his crew as his decision that it was better to sacrifice one than all leaves him in doubt, and his crew in rebellion.
1. Chapter 1

Mal walked into the room. The tails of his brown coat sailed in just a split second after the rest of him. As always when the Captain was meeting a stranger, Zoe entered at his side. Not quite so common, though, was the fact that she was bound and gagged. Mal used his iron grip on her upper arm to throw her off balance and shove her to the floor. If looks could kill, the glance she shot him would have won the Battle of Serenity Valley single-handedly. She tried desperately not to show the pain she felt as her shoulder struck the metal grating that served for a floor in the boat they were on. If her hands had been bound in front of her instead of behind her, she'd at least have been able to catch herself from landing quite so hard. The fact that her ankles only had a few inches of chain between them didn't help so much either.

"You men have the looks of trout, what with your jaws hangin' open like that."

Mal grinned. He always did like it when he could take a man off guard. He gave the woman on the floor a nudge with one boot, and turned his tight smile back to the short little man who was surrounded by several much larger men. One of the larger men made as if to speak, but words were quickly pre-empted by the simple raising of the small man's hand. This hand, it appeared, held quite a bit of power, and Mal almost wondered whether it had been the cause of the noted absence of the other hand. It seemed to like being the only one, singularity bringing it more attention than if it still had its partner. The small man's small mouth spoke with a small voice – small, but cold and firm.

"To be true, Captain Reynolds, I thought you would not bring her." The hand moved a finger to wipe a bit of moisture from a corner of the small mouth.

"Well. She's been brought. Now why don't you take your tiny self and your pet apes and get the hell out of my corner of the 'verse?"

The small man's eyes traveled over Mal's face, searching for something that they did not find. Next, they traveled to Zoe's body, lying still on the floor as she refused to give any of them the pleasure of watching her struggle. Again the hand sent a finger to the lips.

"I must ask, Captain. Why the change of such a heart as yours? Did you not speak that your crew was your kin, and that you were incapable of giving up a single one of them? You seemed particularly upset by the fact I requested the presence of this one."

Mal clenched his jaw for a moment. Damn _gos se_ midget – thinking he's all mighty and such, just because he'd trained a few apes to work for him.

"Yeah, well. I figured if it was going to have to be down to a choice, I figured loss o' one's better than loss of all. And since you were a might particular on your choice, who was I to argue? Of course, I've got a question I gotta ask too. Why her?"

The small man showed his first hint of emotion when his small mouth split open in a small smile. The hand moved ever so slightly, and two of the apes sprang nearly to attention before taking Zoe by her bound hands and feet, carrying her now-struggling body through a door at the far end of the room. Mal was pretty sure he wasn't actually relieved to see her go, but having her tied at his feet and angry with him had been making him a mite uneasy. He watched her go, his face showing none of the thoughts that raced through his head. He didn't like to admit he needed people. But if there was one he'd feel lost without, it was her. He wondered how much trouble she was causing them back there. Mal's train of thought was rather abruptly interrupted when he realized the small man was speaking again.

"… first sergeant in the Alliance Army. I've gone civilian since, of course, but that woman really left a mark on my memory and, well…" The small man raised his absence of a hand and Mal raised an eyebrow. "There are things in this life that are easy enough to forgive. To forget. This is not one of them."


	2. Chapter 2

"You tellin' me this is revenge? You dragged your _shee-niou_ gorillas this far out, just for a bit of payback? Something tells me you didn't need that hand anyway." Mal tried hard not to show the new level of worry he felt right now. Zoe hadn't said anything specific about the situation. She'd said she'd rather not go. He'd lied and said he didn't care. They'd tried to figure something out. But there had been only the two of them, against a whole lot of apes. Apes with guns. Apes with brains. Apes with pieces of his ship. He hadn't seen another way. He'd assumed there was a story there, somewhere. But he hadn't figured the small man for a soldier. He should have, though. Everything always came back to Serenity Valley. Always. He blocked out the mental images that sprang up by re-focusing on the present. Again, he realized that he'd been not listening. He hoped he hadn't missed anything important.

"… she did not seem to feel any remorse for it, even when it became evident that I was speaking the truth of what I knew. I have sought her worlds over and by a stroke of luck, your latest stop had a few folk greedy enough to mention having seen her, at the promise of rewards to come." The small man smiled his small smile again, and nodded a small nod to indicate the end of the meeting.

"I thank you for your understanding and cooperation. Know that you will not find me. Whatever plan you had to get her back will not work."

The gorillas moved to help the Captain from the airlock, but he stood fast for a moment and even approached the small man, who looked even smaller up close. Mal looked down and his eyes looked of nothing but grim determination.

"You'd best listen up, little man, and listen well. Once I get my boat and crew back up, I'm coming for you. And when I find you, I promise to cut off that tiny little hand and feed it to you. You have my word. _Dong le ma?_" His jaw set itself hard, and as the small man opened his small mouth to speak, Mal interrupted with a stare so cold that could have extinguished the fires of Vespian. He held out his hand, and one of the bodyguards filled it with a few pieces of electronics resembling Old Earth motherboards. Another handed him a box with a few larger pieces. With one last glance toward the door through which Zoë had been carried, he turned and left without a word.

He stood there with his back to the airlock doors and heard them slide shut behind him. He closed his eyes hard and fought back the urge to rush back in and strangle the _tah mah de_, despite what he knew the consequences might be. Mal could not believe what he'd just done. In the war, he'd never have given the enemy anything at all, despite the costs. And now? He had just turned over his very own lieutenant – it was hard not to still think of her as the soldier from the war. And the enemy would not be easy to find, perhaps impossible. He turned back toward the doors, meaning to show one last act of defiance. He saw nothing through the small port-hole but stars and the great black that was space.

Captain Reynolds took a deep breath and relaxed the jaw he'd been clenching to the point of headache. He exhaled slowly, firmed up his stance, and headed off. He made his way toward the hallway just outside the bridge, where the crew's quarters were. He swore to himself – in English – as he slipped one of the pieces of the electronics into the door-locking mechanism over an empty bunk they used as a cell in case of emergencies. The mechanism beeped once, and Mal plugged in the pass-code. He hoped to the 'verse that his crew was safe and sound at the bottom of the entry-ladder. He kicked the door open, and his call of greeting was choked off by surprise as his ankle was grabbed by a large hand. A strong pull knocked him off his feet, and he was being drug through the open doorway before he had the chance to react. Mal hit the ground with a resounding thud, and the man with the large hand stopped half-way to knifing him through the heart.

"Jayne!" Mal roared, half in anger and half to mask how glad he was to see the mercenary still alive and kicking (or stabbing, as the case may be). Jayne and Zoe were the only ones on this boat who knew how to fight worth a damn – aside from Shepherd Book's occasional forays into the realm of bad-ass, which still puzzled him considerable. And Mal would need Jayne's help to get Zoe back for sure.

"Oh. Mal. It's you." Jayne stated matter-of-factly as he tucked the eight inches of blade that had just been eight inches from Mal's chest away under his shirt. He offered the Captain a hand, and they both rose to their feet as the rest of the crew seemed to get over their shock. Each of them babbled their own questions, most of which had the word "Zoe" in them somewhere. Mal tried a quiet approach, but soon raised his hand, stamped his boot hard against the steel floor, and shouted.

"_BI ZUIE_!"

They all went silent for a moment and the Serenity's pilot, Wash, was the first to speak.

"Uh… Captain? Zoe's right behind you, isn't she?" The man's bright floral shirt seemed to lose its vibrance as he waited, his shoulders drooping forward a bit at the look on Mal's face. He tried again. "Isn't she?"

Mal looked away for a second before meeting the man's gaze, no emotions showing through his eyes. "She's alive, Wash. But they've got her." He wasn't a man to give bad news gently. Wash slumped a bit, then cocked his head and looked the Captain over. He wasn't a soldier, but he knew how battles went. At least, battles where the Captain lost something.

"You seem to have come through it not much worse for wear, Cap'n. How'd they take her?"

It was Mal's turn to slump, even if he didn't show it, and he shook his head. "They didn't take her. It was either her or the ship. I gave her up."

"You gave her up? Gave her up? Mal, she's your crew. She's your soldier! Mal! She's my WIFE!" Wash landed his fist into Mal's chin and Mal hit the wall behind him. The pilot went at him again and Mal heard the crunch as another blow struck. Jayne and Simon had him pulled off the Captain a moment later. Jayne did most of the holding, being twice the size of the brightly-clad pilot. Simon held all his power in his book-learned words and in his skill with a scalpel. He figured words would be the better choice here.

"Wash! Let him talk. Hitting him isn't going to tell us anything we need to know."

"No. But it feels damn good." His eyes didn't leave Mal's, and the fire in them did not die down one bit. He stopped struggling, though, and Simon let go of his shoulder. Jayne kept hold, but his grip softened to something close to compassion. His brusque voice almost had a gentleness about it.

"It's alright, little man. Captain says she's alive. Let's just focus on that."

Mal rearranged himself and worked his jaw. It was still intact, which meant that the crunch had been Wash's fist. The pilot hadn't even noticed. Captain Reynolds stood up straight and strong, but somehow felt small and vulnerable with the crew's eyes all speaking their accusations. He didn't show it, though. That was part of his job as Captain. Not caring what anyone else thought. He glanced over at Inara and Kaylee, but didn't dare meet Inara's gaze. That woman's look could burn a hole through the side of Serenity, just as surely as it could seduce a client. And Kaylee? Her eyes never showed anything but innocence, and it made Mal hurt every time a little of that innocence died. How she ever managed it way out here in the black – just her and Serenity's engines – was beyond him. He looked over each of the five crew members standing in front of him and spoke.

"You all just keep quiet until I'm done, ya hear? We get through this, and get on with things faster if you do. Zoe and I figured there were fewer of them than there were, and they were smarter than they looked." Mal held up a hand as Jayne started to protest not being allowed to come along. "Some of them worked on taking some bits out o' the ship while Zoe and I thought we was keepin' them at bay. Not sure how they managed, but they did. They took bits that'd keep her from flying, and others that'd – well – life support's only on for another 20 minutes, unless we get Serenity put back together proper. These weren't no amateurs. They knew what they were doing."

Mal stopped speaking, and the rest of them were quiet for a few seconds. Wash was the first to speak. He wasn't normally a man to put himself in charge, but this time his words weren't asking. They were telling, and no one was going to question him – likely because they were a bit stunned by it all.

"Jayne? Give Kaylee a hand putting the engines back in order. Inara? You give your shuttle a good once-over. Make sure everything's as it should be, then see about helping Kaylee. Doc? Grab your kit and meet me on the bridge. Seems I broke my hand."

Mal spoke up, a little surprised to have to regain authority from Wash, of all people. But Wash ignored him, turned to Jayne, and pulled one of the mercenary's pistols from his belt. Jayne very nearly protested, but he knew better. The room froze. The pilot flicked the gun a bit toward the ladder and hatch. The room emptied. The door closed. Wash turned to Mal. He didn't raise the gun or his eyes. He sat on the cot that served for a bed.

"Captain Reynolds." He used the title harshly. "Let's talk."


End file.
